Pep Guardiola considers January defensive target for his Manchester City squad – report

Manchester City remain in the hunt for a centre-back, but as Pep Guardiola revealed at his pre-Spurs press conference last night, even the Blues have their limits on how much they can spend.

“We don’t have too much more to spend but we are going to see,” Guardiola said when asked about signing a new central defender, which would seemingly rule out the likes of Virgil van Dijk, who Southampton have slapped a £60million-plus price-tag on.

Iñigo Martínez of Real Sociedad, one of the players City have been considering, remains an option with his €30million (£26.5million) release clause, but according to Sam Lee at Goal, another name has been discussed in recent days.

Back in January, City were heavily linked with a loan move for Holger Badstuber, who was at Bayern Munich until his contract expired this summer. Instead, Pep decided to stick with what he had and Badstuber headed to Schalke on loan for the remainder of the 2016-17 season, making 12 appearances in all competitions.

And his name has been spoken about by Pep and his staff in the last few days, Goal reports, as he is an experienced German international who is still only 28 years of age. However, the tone of the discussion wasn’t enthusiastic, mainly because Badstuber’s career has been checkered by serious injuries.

Even so, if City find there to be a lack of low-cost candidates good enough and compatible to Pep Guardiola’s style of football, Badstuber could be an option as the summer progresses. He would be available on a free transfer, allowing City to invest their remaining transfer funds into other areas.